Some of my HxC Goteks are not writting ADFs

[ljmarent]

I've purchased 4x AmigaStore.eu Goteks with HxC firmware over the past two years.

My very first one is running 3.7.4.1a. it reads and writes ADF files perfectly.

YAY! The experience was great, so I bought more.

My later HxC Goteks are running 4.0.5.3a and they read ADFs, but only pretend to write to the ADF.
The drive acts like it's writing, but nothing is written to the ADF file, changes are simply lost.

I can write using the older HxC Gotek to a USB stick, move the stick over to a newer HxC Goteks and see the files I wrote..
I can type 'delete <file>' and it responds deleted, but the file is still there.
I can type 'ed <file>', and save my changes, but when I go back and look at the <file>, it is unchanged.

What is this behavior I'm seeing and more importantly, how do I 'fix' this
There are actually four of us here in Toronto with HxC Goteks from AmigaStore.eu that are doing this.
I'm asking for everyone

Thank you,

Gotek.jpg (156.42 KiB) Viewed 14235 times

[Jeff]

This is probably because your last goteks have the Artery AT32F415 mcu instead of the STM32F105 version. (Can you confirm this please ?)

These firmwares are quite old. please update them :
https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_dri ... rmware.zip
(in the "WIP_Firmware")

After this you should able to write to HFE files at least (image to test attached).

Amiga.hfe.zip

(18.04 KiB) Downloaded 355 times

I am currently working on the new firmware for the new AT32F435 Gotek released this week, so i will have a look to the ADF case on 32KB Artery MCU too.

[ljmarent]

(Can you confirm this please ?

To confirm that, would I not have to remove screws and puncture my warrantee void sticker ?

All eight of our Goteks are sold as finished goods, they should have been functionally tested by AmigaStore.eu

So ...

Is it that AmigaStore.eu has sold us fakes, or that they made a manufacturing error by putting the wrong firmware on the units,
or how do we explain that the newer ones don't write ADF files ?

note:
I have two where I've already opened them to remove the red LED, so no harm in peaking.
One of the Goteks MCU's about 12mm x 12mm and says Artery,
The other Goteks MCUis a tiny 5mm x 5mm AT4... chip
So two different hardware designs

[Jeff]

(Can you confirm this please ?

To confirm that, would I not have to remove screws and puncture my warrantee void sticker ?

Update to the latest firmware version (in the WIP_Firmware folder) and then you should be able to see the detected hardware version in the embedded menu without removing the screws.

I don't think that amigastore really follow the development here. The provided firmware is generally outdated. But since this can be updated with an usbstick this is not an major issue.

FYI since 2021 at least 6 gotek hardware revisions was released to deal with the components shortage. Unfortunately the new goteks have only half of the memory (32KB vs 64KB for the old STM32 goteks) of the pre-2021/STM32 goteks and this bring several issues.

One important point : A new AT32F435 gotek with much more memory was released this week to definitively improve the situation.

[ljmarent]

FYI since 2021 at least 6 gotek hardware revisions was released to deal with the components shortage. Unfortunately the new goteks have only half of the memory (32KB vs 64KB for the old STM32 goteks) of the pre-2021/STM32 goteks and this bring several issues.

How AmigaStore.eu advertise their 'finished goods' HxC Goteks:
"This floppy emulator is flashed with the last FlashFloppy firmware for Amiga/Atari/Amstrad/Acorn/IBM-PC, or the universal HxC firmware for Amiga, Amstrad CPC 6128, Atari ST, Sinclair Spectrum +3, and any computer, keyboard, sampler, or CNC machine with a Shugart/PC floppy interface."

This of course indicates that these are sold fully up-to-date upon shipping.
And they make no mention of their troubles with sourcing hardware or constant BOM changes.

For customers who are buying 'finished goods' and not kits of parts to assemble and program themselves.
These supply 'changes' are an abstraction.
We should not need to know this.
The finished goods should simply work as advertised.

I'll try firmware updating one of mine to see if it works, but I think the rest of these units (we keep finding other friends who bought these with this same issue) should be taken back by AmigaStore.eu at their expense, 'repaired' and returned at their expense. They didn't work from day one. We didn't buy bits and bobs, we paid for finished goods.

Please let us know what you find out about ADF write support in the most recent firmware.
Thank you,

note:
I've reached out to AmigaStore.eu with this thread link in my message

[ljmarent]

One of the group followed the firmware update instruction:

He notes:
Do not update firmware as suggested. Mine is now a brick.
It is stuck @ "Reading FAT..." that's all it does now
It locks up when I try to enter the menu now without a USB stick as well.

[Jason]

Hi Jeff,

I am the one who updated to the most recent firmware. My Gotek was purchased from amigastore.eu with HxC preinstalled. To date amigastore has not replied to any of my emails looking for support. This is very disappointing.

By downgrading to 4.0.5.3A I was able to get it reading ADF's again, but the most recent software just locks up the drive. WIthout the write function this drive is not very useful to me.

Looking forward to a firmware update. Thanks for your support.

[Jeff]

FYI since 2021 at least 6 gotek hardware revisions was released to deal with the components shortage. Unfortunately the new goteks have only half of the memory (32KB vs 64KB for the old STM32 goteks) of the pre-2021/STM32 goteks and this bring several issues.

How AmigaStore.eu advertise their 'finished goods' HxC Goteks:
"This floppy emulator is flashed with the last FlashFloppy firmware for Amiga/Atari/Amstrad/Acorn/IBM-PC, or the universal HxC firmware for Amiga, Amstrad CPC 6128, Atari ST, Sinclair Spectrum +3, and any computer, keyboard, sampler, or CNC machine with a Shugart/PC floppy interface."

This of course indicates that these are sold fully up-to-date upon shipping.
And they make no mention of their troubles with sourcing hardware or constant BOM changes.

For customers who are buying 'finished goods' and not kits of parts to assemble and program themselves.
These supply 'changes' are an abstraction.
We should not need to know this.
The finished goods should simply work as advertised.

I'll try firmware updating one of mine to see if it works, but I think the rest of these units (we keep finding other friends who bought these with this same issue) should be taken back by AmigaStore.eu at their expense, 'repaired' and returned at their expense. They didn't work from day one. We didn't buy bits and bobs, we paid for finished goods.

Please let us know what you find out about ADF write support in the most recent firmware.
Thank you,

note:
I've reached out to AmigaStore.eu with this thread link in my message

I am not AmigaStore so i can't really comment this. What i know is that most hardware don't have an up-to-date software in most stores. They can be in storage since months before being shipped.

Regarding my support here if for some reasons you can't / don't want update the firmware i agree with you that we should stop the support. i can't really provide help on this old version and this case resolution will probably need an new firmware release.

Let me know if you are interested by my help and investigations.

EDIT:

And they make no mention of their troubles with sourcing hardware or constant BOM changes.

More details on this thread :
viewtopic.php?f=33&t=4020

[Jeff]

One of the group followed the firmware update instruction:

He notes:
Do not update firmware as suggested. Mine is now a brick.
It is stuck @ "Reading FAT..." that's all it does now
It locks up when I try to enter the menu now without a USB stick as well.

How this gotek is powered ?

[Jason]

How this gotek is powered ?

It is powered through the 4 pin connector to the original Amiga PSU.

[Jeff]

How this gotek is powered ?

It is powered through the 4 pin connector to the original Amiga PSU.

The update should definitively works then. Are you using the "HxCFEUSB_V4_2_10_12a.UPD" update file ?

[Jason]

Yes, perhaps there was an issue with the zip. Amigastore finally did reply and sent the same version. It does appear to work now.

Thank you for your support.

[Jason]

One of our group members still reports errors writing with the new firmware.

"it tries to write now, but ends up getting write errors/track 0 bad/etc."

This is a new build Amiga, so he will be checking with an original floppy for functionality next.

[Jeff]

One of our group members still reports errors writing with the new firmware.

"it tries to write now, but ends up getting write errors/track 0 bad/etc."

This is a new build Amiga, so he will be checking with an original floppy for functionality next.

To the HFE file image ? Does he have the "SWAPMEM.BIN" file on the usb stick ? (this an hidden file generated by the emulator).
Can he retry a different usb stick (another brand) ? These error are generally caused by high latency/slow usb sticks.

(I will anyway improve the internal ADF write support scheme for these low end/low memory goteks.)

[lowlevel]

Hey gang, I'm the one semi-local to ljmarent still having write troubles writing on the gotek I just purchased from amigastore.eu

Initially all attempts to write from the computer appeared to work, but none of the changes were actually taking hold. (You change disks, and the image is empty again when you come back later.)

After applying the provided patch that AmigaStore.eu sent me (v4.2.10.12a) the situation is slightly better in that the attempted write is sticking, however trying to read back anything that was written is resulting in read errors. I'm also unable to format an image in either HFE or ADF form. (I get Unable to format cylinder 0)

I've got it set as follows for now:
System Family - Amiga
Interface - Amiga DD (came as Shugart/so tried both these)
Bitrate -250 (tried 300 too, but I think 250 was right)
Stepping - single stepping

I've tried a few different usb sticks. I've tried formatting them in the gotek. I have also verified that using a regular floppy drive works fine.
I'm kind of out of ideas here and hoping someone can help.

Thanks

lowlevel